November 10, 2008

Her work at Fannie Mae, which had to be bailed out by the government in September as part of a $200 billion deal. Ms. Gorelick left the company just as it was coming under attack for huge accounting failures. She has also drawn criticism for her role at the Justice Department, in which she allegedly created an intelligence “wall” that hindered counterterrorism agents in the years before the Sept. 11 attacks. Conservatives called for her removal from the Sept. 11 commission, but her fellow members rallied around her and said critics were distorting her record. The criticism grew so heated that the F.B.I. investigated a death threat against her family, and President Bush had to intervene personally to stop the Justice Department from releasing sealed reports involving her. Some conservative bloggers have already begun trying to derail Ms. Gorelick’s possible nomination as attorney general, pointing to her experiences at both Fannie Mae and the Sept. 11 commission.

Short of appointing an actual member of al Qaeda, I cannot imagine a more offensive symbolic repudiation of the Global War on Terror — nor a more enthusiastic embrace of the chronic mismanagement, cronyism, and graft which led to this fall's credit crisis — than the appointment of Jamie Gorelick as attorney general.

I voted for Obama, as I'm sure my commenters are about to remind me, and I'm hoping for the best. He told me to hope! Please don't crush my hope so early, Mr. Obama.

ADDED: "They put stickies on the face of Mohammed Atta on the chart that the military intelligence unit had completed, and they said you can't talk to Atta because he's here on a green card." Something I quoted on Instapundit back in August 2005, which got me accused of "enlisting Glenn" in a "smear campaign" against Jamie Gorelick. Here's how Glenn responded at the time.

I totally have to credit Bill (of So Quoted) in an online comment to me early this morning for drawing the connection between Gorelick and Zelig (or Forrest Gump). Her name and face just keeps popping up in connection with costly disasters.

Let's hope that with regard to the Obama administration, she only pops up in the NYT.

Puh-leez folks. This is an old Washington game. Someone is pushing Jamie Gorelick and is using the MSM to float a trial balloon. Or, there is somebody else who has a nontrivial quantity of baggage, but who will look wonderful next to Ms. Gorelick and people are supposed to ignore this new person's issue because "at least it isn't Gorelick."

There are only two ways she'll actually get nominated. First is a variation on the above, let her be a stalking horse and let Republicans take the heat for knocking her down, then put up the person President Obama really wants. Or, perhaps Mr. Obama is is simply overrated in the brains department. (Odds on the latter are pretty long -- I don't like his policies, but very few people think he's stupid. Just misguided.)

Based on some of the names people have floated for Obama's cabinet, Larry Summers and Rahm Emmanuel, I've been cautiously optimistic. Hearing Jamie Gorelick's name has pretty much driven a stake through the heart of that dream, burned it and spread its ashes at a crossroads.

So I will cling instead to the wan hope that the NYT doesn't know what it's talking about.

I disagree with Beldar that Gorelick is worth filibustering, but I'm delighted to see that at least one other conservative has abandoned the view that filibustering Presidential nominees is unacceptable.

I'm pretty sure any Jewish anxieties about Barack Hussein Obama have been eliminated with the pick of Rahm Israel Emanuel as chief of staff and the talk of two establishment Jewish liberals Larry Summers as possible Treasury secretary and Jamie Gorelick as AG.

While I'm here, may I quickly suggest that anyone unfamiliar with John Podesta's think tank consider boning up a bit? That background might come in useful. The think tank is The Center for American Progress (among other of its endeavours is the ThinkProgress). As you know, Podesta co-chairs President-elect Obama's transition team, and, of course, he was chief of staff under Clinton.

She didn't just "work" at Fannie. She was Vice Chair. The so what? The fact that the company was cooking the books under her watch doesn't bother you in the least?

She is directly responsible for the current financial crisis. ALL board members of ANY board are directly responsible for the actions taken by their companies.

The fraud perpetrated by companies like Fannie, Enron etc caused the passage of Sarbanes Oxley which was tailor made for hacks like Gorelick.

"Boards of Directors, specifically Audit Committees, are charged with establishing oversight mechanisms for financial reporting in U.S. corporations on the behalf of investors. These scandals identified Board members who either did not exercise their responsibilities or did not have the expertise to understand the complexities of the businesses. In many cases, Audit Committee members were not truly independent of management."

"The NYT has some basis for forefronting her name. Perhaps the transition team is trying to test the waters. In which case, I would like them to find out that the waters are fully aboil."

Ann, can you explain just why it was that this wasn't enough reason to vote against Obama? ("This" meaning that either O would actually consider Gorelick a viable AG canditate, or that he hangs out with/hires people who do?)

Sal,

Larry Summers, sure, I pretty much agree with your POV. But Emmanuel? One of the main guys who put the "personal" into "the politics of personal destruction"? What hopeful thing could his consideration possibly be a sign of?

Please explain how Fannie and Freddie are a large part of the current crisis. And then explain how Jamie Gorelick contributed to that.

I'm really interested in hearing your nonsensical babble.

Fannie and Freddie were a quasi-governmental agency, doing exactly what they were chartered to do - securitize mortgages. They got burned when the housing marked collapsed as did almost every other financial institution that dealt with mortgages. Yes, they had some accounting irregularities in 2004, but that had nothing to do with the current financial crisis.

She is directly responsible for the current financial crisis. ALL board members of ANY board are directly responsible for the actions taken by their companies. ?

19 McCain fundraisers & advisers lobbied for Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac. Rick Davis was McCain's campaign manager who was paid 5 million dollars over 5 years by an advocacy group set up by Fannie Mae. He was being paid $15,000 month up until Sept for doing absolutely nothing aside being there for access to McCain. You are so full of shit on a consistent basis I have wonder where you find your "news".

I'm sure others here can provide more detail, but here goes: Fannie and Freddie over time vastly expanded the scope of their mortgage underwriting operations and stoutly resisted any attempts to rein in their activities (by imposing some sort of reasonable capital requirements). They were far from passive in all this. And the top execs (hacks like Gorelick) made big $ along the way. Do you read the papers?

DTL: Let's cut to the chase. You are unaware of the investigations into Fannie Mae and its governance? You don't think they matter? Putting aside our current financial crisis and various theories as to its cause, you don't think there were problems with Fannie Mae? The SEC and OFHEO charges mean nothing? There are no grounds to question the judgment of those who were on the board at relevant time periods? You wouldn't want to take such things in consideration in questioning someone's fitness as AG? (And, of course, that's not Gorelick's only problem... .)

Re filibustering Presidential cabinet nominees: Unless the nominee fails the Edwin Edwards test (live boy or dead girl) then the President should have whom he wants on his cabinet. This position, however, in no way applies to judicial nominees where a separate branch of government is involved.

Probably just a question of semantics. Maybe those who voted for Obama and comment here are considered dissenters whereas those who did not vote for Obama are commenters. So by that logic, 100% against Obama - one for Obama (Althouse) divided by said total = 99% +- 2%.

Wrong. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have never underwritten ONE single mortgage. They securitize mortgages, so they act in the secondary market. That's also their charter as originally mandated by the government. That's a big difference. They guarantee half of the mortgages in this country. Do you really think there is anyway they could have NOT been involved in this crisis?

reader iam - I think individuals hold blame, not corporations. Despite my hatred of Bush, you will never hear me going on about how everyone at Enron was unethical and guilty. They weren't. Only a couple of people at Enron were - and they created a bad name for everyone else. The same is true at Lehman. Is there any evidence that anyone at Fannie and Freddie even broke the law, or was it just incompetence (as I suspect)? But it's a quasi-governmental entity. We shouldn't be surprised that there is incompetence there.

Do I blame Gorelick for that incompetence? Well - show me some evidence. I'm willing to listen. She's a lawyer, not an accountant, so its hard for her to have oversight in that matter. Of course, I think she never should have been appointed to that role in the first place, but I can't blame her for taking it. Lots of people accept jobs they are unqualified for. For example - Palin.

I'm perfectly aware that elections have consequences and that administrations get to pick whom they like for various positions. Opponents suck it up, or whatever. However, I'm also of the opinion that the AG is a little different from other positions, and so--IMHO--that one is more worth fighting over. We all of us have more stake in that one, and rightly so.

You have, predictably, ignored the essentials of my comment and focussed on trivialities. To answer your last question - yes - by acceding to reasonable limits on their activities, as suggested by some (such as McCain) from time to time.

The uber-corrupt dimwit boy king(dictator) got whatever he wanted(without one scintilla of punishment), so will Baracky. Tought shit. LOL. I LOVE how it's going so far.

Keep the beautiful, chic photos of the future first couple coming. Love 'em. Why can't we white people generate urbane sophisticates like this? Those going to dinner pictures were amazing, fuck!

I love their policies and their imagery.

Yahoo!

I'd comment on Professor Althouse's superbly inconsistent P.O.V.(just reading the weekend stuff alone is worthy of hours of posts), but she's got a business to run. This is what happens when you cultivate commenters that are so far right as to be virtual dead-enders. I've learned innumerable lessons from watching this scene play out over the last 8-9 months.

In the period of time I have been at this site I've never seen one criticizm of Bush from the top, once the Professor made a comment about doing something competently or something. but that's it. We lefties have been given several gifts this past year from republicans and pseudo-republicans, the gifts will obviously keep coming. The righties and their water-carriers do not have the propensity for introspection and therefore can't self-correct. I think we may get an 8 year run here kids.

I'm pushing Palin/Romney or Romney/Palin for 2012. They will crash and burn with either of them anywhere near the ticket. Do it, I dare you.

As per the model assumptions above, we assume that the underlying (typically the stock) follows a geometric Brownian motion. That is,

dS_t = \mu S_t\,dt + \sigma S_t\,dW_t \,

where Wt is Brownian.

Now let V be some sort of option on S—mathematically V is a function of S and t. V(S, t) is the value of the option at time t if the price of the underlying stock at time t is S. The value of the option at the time that the option matures is known. To determine its value at an earlier time we need to know how the value evolves as we go backward in time. By Itō's lemma for two variables we have

Now consider a trading strategy under which one holds one option and continuously trades in the stock in order to hold - \frac{\partial V}{\partial S} shares. At time t, the value of these holdings will be

\Pi = V - S\frac{\partial V}{\partial S}.

The composition of this portfolio, called the delta-hedge portfolio, will vary from time-step to time-step. Let R denote the accumulated profit or loss from following this strategy. Then over the time period [t, t + dt], the instantaneous profit or loss is

This equation contains no dW term. That is, it is entirely riskless (delta neutral). Thus, given that there is no arbitrage, the rate of return on this portfolio must be equal to the rate of return on any other riskless instrument. Now assuming the risk-free rate of return is r we must have over the time period [t, t + dt]

This is the law of evolution of the value of the option. With the assumptions of the Black–Scholes model, this partial differential equation holds whenever V is twice differentiable with respect to S and once with respect to t."

MadisonMan - the Scalia nomination came down to a choice between two luminaries, both doing penance in administrative law hell - the D.C. Circuit - at the time: Our Hero, and Robert Bork. As much as I'd like to tell you that they looked at both and concluded that Scalia was better, the record seems to establish that Scalia was simply younger and in better health, and therefore thought likely to serve longer.

Hey let Barack be Barack. He is entitled to be surrounded by people who think and act like he would. If he can't get Ms. Gorelick through I hope he nominates Lynn Stewart or Ron Kuby so he can have an attorney general who reflects his world view.

Remember - McCain was saying that the fundamentals of the economy were sound only two months ago - and every Republican believed it. Yet now you're blaming Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac for not anticipating the subprime collapse several years back.

Hmm - very few economists predicted that. But Krugman was one of them.

I didn't predict it. Although I was aware that we had a huge problem since August 2007 (as was most of Wall Street), when the credit crisis started.

And I never gave a crap that McCain's campaign manager had connects to Freddie Mae. So what.

Ms. Gorelick would also bring corporate experience to an Obama administration at a time of financial crisis.

2. Roger J said: Roger J. said... Re filibustering Presidential cabinet nominees: Unless the nominee fails the Edwin Edwards test (live boy or dead girl) then the President should have whom he wants on his cabinet.

While I agree in general, I'd draw the line where past bad behavior that is directly germane to the office being appointed. Having said that, (and I know she's just acting for a client) some of Ms Gorelick's claims on behalf of Duke would appear to indicate that she fails to understand the fundemental rights of accused and the rights to privacy accorded all Americans.

3. I would note that Rahm Emmanuel was also a Fannie Director

4. I heard a rumor that Sarbanes Oxley doesn;t apply to the GSE's. Apparently the Dem's put an exemption in that doesn't require that the GSEs do: Sarbanes-Oxley Act on the GSEs, including certification of financial statements, codes of ethics, loan prohibitions, and independent audit committees.

If those nasty Republicans block Ms. Gorelick from Attorney General perhaps she can get to be in charge of Homeland Security.

She can make sure that all those freedom fighters get out of Guantánamo Bay and that all terrorists all over the world have the same rights and privileges as American citizens. It is most important that everyone else in the world look favorably on America and that whole terror thing was really overblown anyway.

1) They don't hand out ChemE degrees w/o being able to solve differential equations. Which has been helpful since I've gone through about a dozen text books from top graduate B school programs in the states. I know that my understanding of the "intricacies" of these instruments has helped me comprehend the interrelatedness, limits, and potential risks of these products.

2) I'm not claiming ownership of the formula. This seems to be a surprise to you. Which means that I've narrowed my identity, by eliminating two Nobel prize winners. [One side benefit, is that you now know I'm not partially responsible for LTCM.]

MadisonMan said..."Simon, I now see that my memory is failing me, and that Kennedy, not Scalia, was the post-Ginsburg nominee."

According to Greenburg (corroborated by Toobin, IIRC), Kennedy was picked out of sheer exhaustion. The White House was out of steam after Bork was rejected and Ginsburg withdrew, and took the path of least resistance. Kennedy seemed confirmable, so they went with him despite vigorous protests from several at DoJ who knew exactly what kind of Justice AMK would be. As a result, we've had to sit through two decades of mushy, foggy prose (and even mushier, foggier thinking) polluting the U.S. Reports. There must surely be liberal lawyers who, from time to time, faced with the task of deciphering one of Kennedy's orotund little missives, have privately lamented that in some ways, it would have been better to have Ginsburg - or even Bork - on the court after all.

1jpb -- your level of condescension is particularly off-putting, given that you're presenting partial differential equations, cookbook math, as if it's the pinnacle of human knowledge.

I'm no world-class mathematician, but I taught a course in partial differential equations to undergraduates. Get over yourself, dude. Chemical Engineering -- the last resort for those who can't make it through Electrical.

Since the Democrats are in all of the attorney generals will be fired and that will be just great. You see anything that the Republicans did that was a crime and a sin will be a-ok now. If you do not believe me, just wait to read about it in the New York Times.

And the press without a wimper will cite the fact that Clinto did it, so it's normal practice, but the way that Bush waited on only fired some was clearly "partisan" and illegal.

Drill Sgt, you know very well you are distorting history. Of course Bush fired them all (I think technically they all offered their resignations) at the start of his term. SOP. Where Bush went wrong, and how that lackey Gonzales found himself out of a job, was by having people fired who didn't pursue with enough aggression Democrats -- that is, by turning the USA Atty office into a branch of the Republican Party. Now, I don't know if Bush had anything at all to do with the Gonzales imbroglio -- my gut says probably not. But he did hire his good friend to do all the shady shenanigans. This lousy mindset is, IMO, one reason the Republicans are soon to be on the outside looking in. No one likes an obviously and demonstrably corrupt party.

DBQ why would you encourage this "gibberish" ignorance if you are acknowledging that differential equations are important?

Great catch!! It should also be added that this bit of intimidating gibberish pushed LTCM and several other hedge funds into insolvency with the public paying to clean up the wreck.

I hope this isn't a sign of the right wing's new attack on intellect. Do you folks really think that you don't need differential equations? Is this related to creationism, i.e. since there are no deferential equations in the Bible, we must not use them? [I attend an Assemblies of God church, so please save the claims that I'm anti-God.]

I'll put it in terms of the gun argument so you can understand: Differential equations don't destroy institutions, people destroy institutions.

Pastafarian,

I think I can hold my own regarding differential equations. For "fun" I took graduate level courses in Physics (among other programs that were totally unrelated to my degree.) While in these classes I was able to use computer systems to churn for days in order to determine molecular level structures based on quantum mechanic level energy formulas that I worked out. [And, BTW, the calculated structures for known molecules perfectly matched the known structures, which confirmed the the stability of the designed structures that were based on my quantum mechanics formulas.]

I'll admit that I didn't find this especially taxing, but the professors were blow-away (and many of the students for that program were unhappy because I was influencing the grading curve) so I must have been doing something notable, especially as an "outsider."

P.S.I'm sure that the relative difficulty of E programs varies from school to school. I chose ChemE precisely because it was the most difficult E program at my school. It also had (has?) a multi-year run at being the highest paid non-professional degree straight out of school. Of course, I quickly realized that owning your own business, and then being an executive in corporate America are more profitable, so I've been an apostate ChemE for a long time.

I hope this isn't a sign of the right wing's new attack on intellect. Do you folks really think that you don't need differential equations?

When you cut-and-pasted the differential equation stuff, I thought you were just a tool. But now you've made it obvious that you are an idiot. To be perfectly clear: Althouse's comment section does not now, and will likely never, need differential equations.

Whether or not your particular occupation requires the use of differential equations is immaterial to the discussion at hand. (For the record, I took my required year of calculus at MIT and then never looked back. The physics, econ and finance courses I took back then didn't get into any real heavy lifting.)

You all should stop arguing with 1jpb. He is obviously super duper smart.

-------

Writing of odd ideas for appointments or advisers, what's the deal with Daley's brother being on the economic transition team? No matter how great the guy is, it seems like Obama wouldn't want the stink of infamous Chicago politics following him to the White House.

It's interesting that Obama's team would float the name of someone hostile to civil rights for AG. How is she hostile to civil rights? She was the one flacking the "Clipper Chip" to Congress - it would have given the government keys to all crypotgraphy performed by individuals and corporations in the US. None of your private transactions on the InterTubes would have been secure from government snooping. None.

1jpb wrote: And, BTW, the calculated structures for known molecules perfectly matched the known structures, which confirmed the the stability of the designed structures that were based on my quantum mechanics formulas.

I don't know how you got so far off topic, but nobody gives a shit whether calculated structures match known structures-that's just benchmarking. The sole utility of calculating chemical structures is predicting unknown chemical structures and transition states. And as you well know, that's a different story.

A lot of these people who've been tapped or whose names have been floated seem like payback picks. I think that's a waste. Obama doesn't owe the Democratic establishment anything. Plus, he's going to be the President of the United States; he doesn't need these has-beens and hangers-on. He's all the rage and the media loves him. I don't know why he bothers with these people.

"She has brought disaster every place she worked. I'm hoping she will do her magic on the Obama administration"

Correct, in theory. But Gorelick as AG can wreak way too much havoc in the meantime. Let's hope O will put his lefties in highly visible, but relatively harmless offices instead, like Bill Ayers as Secretary of Education.

Obama doesn't owe the Democratic establishment anything. Plus, he's going to be the President of the United States; he doesn't need these has-beens and hangers-on. He's all the rage and the media loves him. I don't know why he bothers with these people?

Because the close Obama confidants could not pass security clearance, so hes stuck with the lifers and other peoples confidants.

Once I figured out how many beers were in a twelve pack, I pretty much gave up on dV = \left(\mu S \frac{\partial V}{\partial S} + \frac{\partial V}{\partial t}+ \frac{1}{2}\sigma^2 S^2\frac{\partial^2 V}{\partial S^2}\right)dt + \sigma S \frac{\partial V}{\partial S}\,dW.

Maybe I'm using "designed" where you're using "unknown." I used the testing to demonstrated that my modeling worked. Of course, this was only the first step but it justified applying my model to "unknown" structures.

I should clarify that I was using quantum mechanics to calculate precise three dimensional molecular level structures--not the simplistic stick and orb three dimensional models that folks usually think of when they picture molecular structures.

And, beyond simply determining the most energetically stable precise three dimensional molecules, I was able to test energy induced fluctuations in these three dimensional structures. And, my math for energy changes of the unknown structures was confirmed by testing with known structures, e.g. I was able to use quantum mechanics to determine the relationship between photon energy and the two precise three dimensional structures and energy levels of retinal.

That's cool, in a very geeky way.

With enough computer power it's possible to determine all molecular level characteristics and changes using quantum mechanics.

Gorelick didn't create the "wall" - it was built during the Carter Administration. What she did was make it higher and thicker, for no good reason but to appease her own notions of fair play for terrorists. In that she is a perfect fit for the Obama (PBUH)Administration. Maybe Bill Ayers can be her special advisor on terrorism!

I'm pretty sure any Jewish anxieties about Barack Hussein Obama have been eliminated with the pick of Rahm Israel Emanuel as chief of staff and the talk of two establishment Jewish liberals Larry Summers as possible Treasury secretary and Jamie Gorelick as AG.

I don't think Gorelick is Jewish. She is a Clintonista with serious baggage and about the last sort Obama would want back at Justice, reporting to Bill and Hillary after damaging appointment hearings smearing President Obama with embracing the archtect of terrorist-friendly rules and Fannie Mae lack of rules.(Aside from the old palsied bulldyke herself).

I expect that Obama will have half his "power player" appointments be Jews, roughly what Clinton had, with less white male Gentiles, their diminished nomber taken up by more women and blacks.

That Obama is going to think of the rich and powerful Jews that mentored his career since Harvard, and gave him and his wife good jobs since law schools is no surprise. He also has obligations to the Daley machine and certain black apparachniks that mentored him.

All that said, Rahm Emmanual is no payback, or affirmative action for Jews, pick. He is an ideal pick.

I hope C4 never delivers that particular load of rubbish, or at least not to this esteemed forum.

I see your point. But aren't you curious as to how someone becomes so fixated on something random, like Jewish people, and sees nearly everything in the world through what he perceives to be its connections to that random thing? I am.

Nice to see conservatives start caring again about who gets appointed to key positions instead of being content with horse judges. That's change we can believe in my friends.

garage,

you should be as wary of Obama as the rest of us. He did exactly the same thing to Hillary as he did to McCain and, especially, Palin: he used the political equivalent of a hatchet on them, all while claiming to be engaging in a "new kind of politics."

Very interesting to see how differential equations have been raised here in the context of understanding the financial meltdown. I built models using this equation to evaluate CMOs for Bloomberg back in the 90's, and I eventually couldn't stand the abuse of mathematics anymore. (Don't get me started on the even more elaborate and ridiculous epicycles such as "GARCH".) Diff EQs are great for physics, but fictitious when applied to markets, and overreliance on pseudo-physical mathematical models is what allowed a bunch of people with very high IQs but no common sense to almost destroy the financial industry.

Gorelick is now involved in representing Duke University in a lawsuit file in the rape-fraud case. She is as slimy as they get. If Obama wants a war with Republicans he couldn't find a better trigger than Gorelick.

in which she allegedly created an intelligence “wall” "Allegedly"?--didn't the memo Ashcroft waved have her name on it?The reaction of the other commissioners to her obvious conflict of interest (and bad policy) should have deflated the commission's credibility with the public. Why didn't it?

Downtownlad said:"Please explain how Fannie and Freddie are a large part of the current crisis. And then explain how Jamie Gorelick contributed to that. I'm really interested in hearing your nonsensical babble."

DTL, you are an abject idiot. Jamie Gorelick was an executive officer at Fannie Mae from 1997 through 2003. She was personally responsible for Fannie Mae increasing the amount of sub-prime CRA mortgages that it acquired. Here is what this miscreant said in a press release published by BusinessWire in 2001:""Our approach to our lenders is `CRA Your Way'," Gorelick said. "Fannie Mae will buy CRA loans from lenders' portfolios; we'll package them into securities; we'll purchase CRA mortgages at the point of origination; and we'll create customized CRA-targeted securities. This expanded approach has improved liquidity in the secondary market for CRA product, and has helped our lenders leverage even more CRA lending. Lenders now have the flexibility to use their own, customized loan products," Gorelick said. [http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0EIN/is_2001_May_7/ai_74223918]

Does this answer your question moron? She was promoting the CRA loans and increasing the number of these loans. The New York Times reported on this idiotic policy in 1999 and said, "In moving, even tentatively, into this new area of lending, Fannie Mae is taking on significantly more risk, which may not pose any difficulties during flush economic times. But the government-subsidized corporation may run into trouble in an economic downturn, prompting a government rescue similar to that of the savings and loan industry in the 1980's." [http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C0DE7DB153EF933A0575AC0A96F958260&scp=1&sq=september%201999%20fannie%20mae&st=cse].

According to Peter Wallison, by 2008, Fannie and Freddie held or had securitized over 1 Trillion dollars of sub-prime loans which constitutes one third of the entire sub-prime market. Those sub-prime mortgages were acquired pursuant to the idiotic policies of Gorelick, Raines and the Clinton Administration. This whole mess shows Gorelick is incompetent. But then again we already knew she was an idiot based on her role in hindering our intelligence agencies from sharing information about terrorists with the Justice Dept. All of that is separate from her role in cooking Fannie's books so that she could profit to the tune of 26 million in bonuses.

Democrats are hopeless. You know what you know and it just doesn't matter what the facts are. We are in serious trouble for the next four years, if not longer. Democrats screw up everything they touch and they are too stupid to understand what they have done.

But aren't you curious as to how someone becomes so fixated on something random, like Jewish people

What's random about it?!! It's deeply traditional, a well-trodden rut that it takes no effort or thought to fall into. It's a strong attractor, with the force of immemorial habit even if it is nonsensical from the get-go. People are fixated on Jews because people before them were fixated on Jews, so Jews must be the ones to be fixated on.

It reminds me for some reason of all the exultation that we've overcome racism. When you think about it, racism is so astonishingly moronic in the first place that thinking overcoming it is a great achievement only makes humankind look really primitive and pathetic. Judging someone based on the color of their skin -- it's ludicrous!

1jpb, I have a Master's degree in ChemE and have practiced in the field for 20 years. No ChemE I know brags about their intellect to strangers on the Internet. The satisfaction of doing the job well is sufficient. Perhaps you are an apostate ChemE for a reason.

This is just the beginning -- Ann, you were a fool to vote for Obama. Unfortunately, the rest of us who saw exactly what kind of thug Obama is will have to live with his "rule" (his word) by decree (executive order).

Next it will be his civilian "blueshirts" parallel paramilitary group silencing dissent.

No surprises here. Obama ran as a blank slate and you could put whatever beliefs and values you wanted unto him. Now that he actually has to make decisions, most Americans will be shocked and stunned over the next few months and years. We did try to warn you Ann. All that talk about Ayers and Wright wasn't smear, dear. It was evidence of his thinking and his value system. Believe me, Ann, you have no idea what this con-man is about to do next. Stay tuned...